


Within Me, A Tempest

by Nova_Gleaming



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anya & Clarke Griffin Friendship, Anya Lives (The 100), BAMF Anya (The 100), Blood and Injury, Camp Jaha | Arkadia, Canon-Typical Violence, Clexa, Endgame Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Anya/Raven Reyes, F/F, Fix-It of Sorts, Hang on to yer hats, Heavy Angst, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Torture, It's got it all folks, Let Clarke Griffin deal with her emotions, Lovers to enemies to lovers, POV Clarke Griffin, Polis, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Slow Burn, Some Fluff, Some Humor, This will be long, Unreliable Narrator, War, clarke is a mess, eventually, get ready, post-season 2 finale, so much plot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:48:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27544105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nova_Gleaming/pseuds/Nova_Gleaming
Summary: In which Clarke is dragged from the woods, kicking and screaming, and her anger does not abate with gentleness and patience. Nor is Lexa honourable enough to tell the Arkers that she has brought this storm home.****Some catching up on the AU: Anya is alive, because I’ve had enough stupid death in canon. She still escapes the Mountain with Clarke, but the Ark guards shoot her bicep, nothing essential. Then Clarke gets hit in the head, the guards bring them both back to Arkadia and they save her. When Clarke and Anya go to see Lexa together she is grateful to have Anya back, but still wary, and things proceed as before until Clarke leaves into the woods after the Mountain falls.There is a meaningful look when Lexa betrays Clarke at the Mountain. Anya makes eye contact with Clarke’s lost and shaken gaze and looks almost regretful as she turns to follow her Commander.
Relationships: Anya & Clarke Griffin, Anya & Lexa (The 100), Clarke Griffin & Wells Jaha, Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Clarke Griffin/Niylah, Lexa & Nightbloods (The 100)
Comments: 26
Kudos: 115





	1. Into the Woods

**Author's Note:**

> Clarke deserves to deal with her emotions. The show piles on a Lot of Trauma, and Clarke just.. keeps going? I guess? Which is completely unrealistic, so I'm helping her work through her shit. Or rather, Lexa is. 
> 
> Please read the tags before you read this fic, it does get a bit graphic. Big thanks to my beta, AllAround10, without whom I might not be sticking this out. Your encouragement and support keeps me going. That said, all mistakes are my own. I welcome comments and questions! Enjoy!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Into the woods, it's time to go  
> I hate to leave, I have to, though"  
>  \- S. Sondheim

Clarke stumbles over a root and curses herself for what feels like the millionth time that day.

Finding her balance, she sighs and glances up through the trees at the ever darkening sky. It has been three days since she turned her back on Arkadia and ventured into the woods, alone. She stopped at the dropship and the bunker on her way out, picking up some supplies she had realized belatedly that she would need. But it has been three days of wandering the woods, ever further beyond the trees she was familiar with and she hasn’t yet found anywhere safe to stop for the night. Three days, and her rations are running very low because walking endlessly made her surprisingly hungry, given everything she’s been through. She thought she was better equipped than this.

She thought she was stronger than this. 

Making her way gradually along yet another low ridge, she finally spots something of an overhang and scrambles over to it gratefully. It’s not deep, but it should be enough for now. She gets to work, setting up her tent and covering it as best she can with moss and vines. There were some hanging down already, so it makes the task easier. With nothing to cook, she considers whether a fire will be worth the warmth at the expense of her safety. She doesn’t want to draw anything to her, but she’s definitely not in a position to be fighting off another panther in her current state. 

A small, bitter voice in her head expresses the sentiment that she has been through worse, but she shakes it off and gathers enough branches and kindling to keep burning for a few hours. She always had others with her to help with everything else, and somehow that thought hits even more bitterly. She would almost welcome the sight of Finn watching her again. His disapproving look would at least give her something to rage against besides herself. His silence would break through the loudness of her thoughts. 

She stares determinedly into the fire and forces away the images of Mount Weather, lingering at the edges of her mind throughout the long days out here. This was supposed to let her heal, let her clear her head, but she feels just as lost as she did before. With a sigh, she pulls the sleeping roll tighter around her shoulders against the evening chill and puts her head down onto her arms. The ghosts will keep. She needs to rest. 

* * *

“No, no, _NO!_ ” 

Clarke screams awake, panting furiously, her fire faded to ash in front of her flailing arms. 

Another nightmare. 

She tries to calm her breathing and rubs her eyes, trying to fight off the screams of the dead that echoed louder than her own, the last of her cries still bouncing back from the trees. She looks around, tears brimming in her eyes, but the woods stare back, silent as ever. 

The dawn has not yet come, but it can’t be far off. Clarke growls and shrugs out of her blanket and trudges a few meters away from her tent to relieve herself. She is keeping a wary eye out, aware as ever that anything could be hiding just out of view, when something shifts. 

Her breath catches and she blinks, trying not to look startled. It could be just another shadow, the vestiges of her nightmare still taunting her, but she can’t allow herself the luxury of that best case scenario. Her eyes strain, scanning the darkness for any indication that she is not alone. Nothing moves. She finishes, lifts her pants back up to her waist and carefully makes her way back to her things. 

Kicking the remnants of her fire from the night before into the dirt, mixing with the mulch and moss, she packs up as quickly as she can and is on the move again within a few minutes. 

* * *

Her father’s watch stopped ticking a long time ago, but she has taken to fidgeting with the gears, watching the hands move in endless circles as she loses herself in thought. She is hiding behind a wide trunk in the midst of a dark meditation on the passage of time when she hears a snap later that day. Having stopped to set a trap, her head snaps up, daring to hope that her gamble has worked and she has caught something. She moves as silently as possible, looking towards the simple snare she had set when the sun was directly overhead.

To her extreme disappointment it hasn’t been touched, but that forces her to look around again, glancing over her shoulder in fear. Her hand reaches for the pistol at her waist. She didn’t imagine the sound, she’s sure of it. Not for the first time, she wonders if she’s going crazy, but dismisses the notion. She can’t imagine she’s losing it - if she were going to, it would have happened a long time ago. Her eyes narrowing in frustration, she packs up the trap, unwinding her rope and stashing it back into her pack. She’ll have to move on. Somewhere else will have rabbits, even if monsters are stalking her too. 

The next place she stops is a few hours away, over another ridge in the endless forest, beneath a tree with branches just low enough to hoist herself up. She sets the trap thinking of the droppings she passed a little while ago, praying the hole she saw nearby is a burrow. Climbing gracelessly into the tree, she makes sure the rope has enough slack to look invisible to the incautious mammal that might come for the nuts she left below her. While she waits she scans the trees, appreciating the value of higher ground. She remembers the early days when she and the others did not yet know they weren’t alone, realizes how easy it must have been for the Grounders to survey them. 

Suddenly, she realizes she hasn’t been nearly cautious enough on her own trek thus far. If the Grounders wanted to watch her and follow her again, it would be only too easy to set themselves up above her, out of sight from the ground. With a lifetime of experience climbing trees and remaining silent, of course they would manage to stay invisible. 

_One more stupid regret_ , she thinks. She will have to re-evaluate her sleeping choices. If she catches anything today, she decides, she will make sure she isn’t followed and make a nest of her own. It’s been long enough, the Grounders aren’t the only ones who know how to survive in the woods anymore. 

Another hour and Clarke almost shouts in relief when she manages to catch something. It isn’t a rabbit, but the squirrel is definitely bigger than she remembers them being in her Earth Skills books. For once, she’s grateful the radiation left things so messed up down here. 

* * *

That night, Clarke has hoisted herself and her pack as far up into a dense evergreen as she dares. She wrapped herself in her sleeping roll and tucked herself into a few conveniently overlapping branches in the tree. She took the time to try and lose anyone that might have been tracking her after her meal, crossing a river in multiple places, taking care to not leave tracks as best as she could. She prays that she will be safe at least one more night. 

Her eyes have barely closed and she can feel the ghosts of the dead gathering around her again, crowding into her subconscious, each clamouring for her attention. 

_How dare you!_ They hiss at her angrily. _How could you do this to us? This is your fault!_ Blistered and burnt hands reach for her: Mountain men without gas masks, charred Grounders from outside the Dropship, hollow-eyed kids, the ones who didn’t live long enough to know the hardships they’d miss. 

“No! I tried!” she is sobbing, in her dream. “I wanted to save everyone!” 

_Not everyone, not enough,_ come the furious replies. _Not enough for us. You wanted this, you wanted us out of the way, you wanted the easy way out!_ Clarke crumples as she sees Wells in the crowd, staring at her with disappointment. _You abandoned us Clarke. You abandoned me._

“No! Wells, no! I wouldn’t! I tried! Please!” No matter her pleas, he shakes his head, staring her down like the rest of them. 

_Not enough. Not enough, never enough._ It echoes through her mind, over and over, she is screaming, crying helplessly. She can feel them picking at her, pulling at her clothes, her hair. A particularly painful pinch feels like it tears through her cheek and she jolts awake with a yelp of pain. 

Blinking for a moment, she wonders if it can possibly be daylight already, the blurry light around her shining bright through the branches. Then she feels the hot drip of real blood on her face and her vision clears. What she sees around her has her releasing another scream as she scrambles to pull her arms free. 

Glowing purple beetles, the size of her hands, have descended on her perch. They seem to be cautious, and her scream has pushed at least one back, but glowing eyes and huge pincers are starting to move back in. As more emerge she realizes they are coming from _inside_ the tree. Their backs glow darker red as wings flutter out from thick shells. Short legs propel them forward, and waving antennae have her heart beating faster as she knocks one, then another off a branch. A third gets another pinch of skin from her hand as she pulls a knife from her sleeve. She swipes it away and frantically begins untying the knots holding her pack in place. They keep coming. She’s getting pinched repeatedly and as their numbers grow she stabs one, launches it through another few of them and they scatter for a moment.

It’s not enough. No amount of Earth Skills could have prepared her for this. 

She finally works her pack free, and begins to shuffle toward the ground, still half inside her blanket. The beetles seem to be denser further up. She has fewer to fight through as she half climbs, half falls downwards. They are still crawling over her, the shifting, blinking red light making her feel like this could almost be another nightmare. 

_It is_ , she reminds herself. This life on the ground has been one horror after another. She doesn’t know why she expected that to change out here. There’s a calm, bitter part of her mind berating her even as it holds the rest of her panic at bay, and she almost laughs. _This is insane._

She makes it to the ground and shakes off a few more beetles. She pushes her blankets away and almost runs away without it, shaking at the lingering feeling of too many too-small legs crawling over her skin. Holding her knife carefully she approaches her roll again and kicks it. Nothing comes out. She chances a glance back up and sees the shifting red glow still clear above her, but they don’t seem to be coming down, for which she is unbelievably grateful. She gingerly picks up the roll, shakes it out for good measure, and is rewarded with two more beetles falling out and scuttling back toward the trunk. With a final shiver she tucks it under her arm and decides to fold it while she walks.

Without the movement of the sun overhead there is no way of telling how much time has passed as she treks on. She hopes she isn’t going in circles, but her calves have started to ache and she’s beginning to suspect that grove of trees with the blue luminescent moss on the trunks is following her, when she finally spots a small cave. It’s barely 4 feet tall, maybe ten feet from the river, but she looks in and realizes it’s just barely deep enough to lay in. _Good enough for now,_ she decides. She’s barely gotten her roll back out before she stumbles in and sleeps.

* * *

Clarke’s eyelids flutter softly as she struggles back to wakefulness, but her dreams have not left her. At first she swears she’s on the Ark. Her cell walls are closing in, her drawings floating around her, even more lifelike than usual. She realizes gradually that the trees she sketched out are moving in the breeze, the birds are really chirping, she can smell the rich soil still damp from morning dew. Her head lifts in bliss and hope as her surroundings blend together, the remaining metal walls actively disintegrating as she pushes her aching body to stand and takes a slow, cautious step forward. 

_Earth, at last._

But then, even as she pulls herself up, the trunks of the trees themselves seem to be moving. She knows there were no species of mobile trees in this part of the world from the records of Before, so she shakes her head and squints, her head tilting and her balance swaying dangerously. As she catches herself and swims upright, dark figures begin to detach themselves from the mass of wilderness and stalk in her direction. They’re too far away to make out, but she wants to call out to them. 

“Hello!” Her voice is raspy from disuse. Long days in her cell alone, she didn’t have much cause for conversation. Being put in solitary for the crime of trying to save her people left her bitter and angry, but these people are _here_ , on _Earth_ and she feels a desperate need to understand. “Who are you? How did you survive?”

Her calls go unanswered, even as her voice finds itself and smooths out a little more. 

More and more figures emerge, as if in response. They are appearing closer and closer to her. The nearest ones are starting to sharpen, but do not yet come into focus, everything has a strange reddish-purple hue and Clarke shakes her head again in confusion. _What is going on?_

The nearest figures cannot be more than 12 feet away, and they begin to raise their arms, one by one, to point at her. 

“Yes, I’m here! Who are you?” she tries again, but then the pointing figures step forward and come into focus and she wishes she hadn’t asked. 

_Atom. Maya. Artigas. Finn. Dante. Wells._ Clarke’s knees give out and she falls with a splash into the shallow stream she didn’t even realize she’d stepped into. One hand comes to break her fall, but gravity seems heavier than usual and she slips bodily into the water. Thankfully, it’s not deep, but she pushes herself up on one arm and raises the other in defense, her dripping hair not enough to shelter her from the accusing gazes on the opposite bank. 

“No, please, no…,” Clarke is sobbing, all of her guilt and pain rushing back at once with the faces swimming into view. There are more figures coming forward from the trees further back. The inhabitants of Mount Weather. The Grounders from the dropship. Everyone is there, some burnt, blistered, bleeding, then not. Their suffering flickers in and out of existence, a stark reminder of exactly what she took from them, the lives they could have lived if she had not stolen their time. 

They don’t speak this time. They just watch her. The silence of the woods is all she gets, the weight of their grief and her own pushing her gaze downwards, away from the gruesome apparitions. She cannot bear to look at them any longer. Only her own flickering reflection looks back up at her through the slow-moving waves. Her eyes are red-rimmed, dark bags underneath. She could swear they are also glowing red. 

Her gaze narrows and she shakes her head once more. _This can’t be real._

She looks back up into the trees and sees the horrible yellow mist encroaching on the figures. They are being swallowed, but not one moves. She can barely make them all out through the thickness of it as it drifts slowly toward her. 

_Is that real too?_

Clarke seems to recall dimly that they destroyed the tanks in the Mountain where this mist came from, but she can’t be sure. Maybe this is the end. She looks up into the silent, dark eyes of Wells before it takes him. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, too grieved to even cry anymore. “I didn’t mean for this to happen.” 

The yellow mist hisses slightly as it takes her over. She feels her arm give out under her and the cool water under her face feels like a blessing. 

* * *

Clarke wakes to more nightmares. She is somehow on the edge of the stream, unsure if she’s left her things behind or not. Kids from the Mountain are playing across the water. She sees them holding hands, laughing as they run after each other in some kind of game. Their carefully ironed clothes are worn out on their tiny shoulders. Clarke blinks and things blur, but she catches a snippet of their song as she watches blisters spread across their skin. 

“ _...pocket full of posy, we All Fall Down...”_ They scream among the last few words, laughter becoming shrieks. 

A tear leaks down her cheek as strangely red flames engulf the children in front of her. Unable to watch any longer, Clarke closes her eyes again and falls back into the mist.

* * *

When she resurfaces, there are Grounders all around her. They are not warriors, really. They wear their mismatched dark clothing, intricate hairstyles but no warpaint. Holding baskets, holding firewood, holding children. They speak around her, murmuring words in a language she can’t understand. They seem peaceful as they mill around and she wonders how she got here. She lifts a hand, weakly, and calls out to them. 

They do not reply, but turn in unison towards her wobbling voice. She watches from her sprawled out position on the ground as one by one they put down what they hold and pull out weapons. Their soft faces turn to snarls, menace glittering in their eyes as they shift and ready to fight. _Who are they fighting?_

Clarke realizes she is the only one there for them to attack and attempts to lift an arm, blearily realizing she doesn’t have the strength to fight anything right now. Two of the grounders approach her and she closes her eyes, resigned to her fate, as they grab her by the arms and lift her out of the water with surprising gentleness. As her feet drag behind her along the forest floor, she hears them still talking over her head. This time their words are more crisp, but she still doesn’t understand. Some words stand out. 

“...Skaiyon...” “...kwelnes...” “...Wanheda.”

They deposit her back in her cave and she tries to decipher the snippets. “Kwelnes” means weakness. She remembers that from the war, Indra had certainly used it often enough. “Skaiyon”.. That’s what they called the Arkers, she knows, but “Wanheda” is new. “Heda” is Lexa, but this sounds different. Lexa isn’t here. She doesn’t think so anyway. She focuses on new anger in her meandering thoughts. _Lexa isn’t here anymore... She_ **_left_ ** _me. She abandoned my people._ A low growl drifts out, even though she can’t really move. 

“Heda.. Betrayer.. _Kill_ you..”

It takes too much energy, but she finds she means it. She holds on to that as she drifts. 

* * *

The Grounders who carried her rouse her again, and she screams at their glowing red faces looming over her, twisted into snarls. One of them sits her up and holds her in place while the other grabs her chin and makes her drink something foul. She tries to bite the warrior's hand, but it only leads to them grabbing her face and roughly forcing her mouth open. Left with no choice, she sputters through it but gets it down. Disdain colours their glowing, snarling faces and they lower her back to the ground. Clarke wants to get up and fight but her limbs fail her, trapped under their own weight.

The warriors are still standing over her, watching, and she emits a small groaning snarl of her own before everything fades again.

* * *

Clarke is disoriented as she wakes, blinking away - nothing. She suddenly jolts as she realizes that she’s actually slept well and feels rested for the first time since leaving Arkadia. She tries to count how many days it’s been, but as her recent memories flood back she realizes more time may have passed than she can account for. 

_What happened to me?,_ she wonders. 

Now lucid, Clarke feels acutely aware that her reality was very skewed the last few times she was awake. The red glowing eyes she saw in her reflection in the stream make her shudder, but remind her of the beetles she fell out of a tree to escape, now that she’s functional enough to make the connection. Her hand comes up to feel the still-healing cut on her cheek from sharp pincers. _Shit._ She should have known there would be more consequences. _Poison radioactive beetles. Of course._

She supposes she should just be grateful she’s not dead. Then reconsiders. How is she _not_ dead? Clarke reflects on how real everything felt, right down to the Grounders who carried her back to her cave and made her drink something _horrible_ \- Wait. 

She _is_ in the cave. The aftertaste in her mouth means she really did drink something disgusting, meaning the two warriors were real. Right down to their Trikru facepaint and casual conversation over her half-conscious body. 

Clarke jumps to her feet, hitting her head on the ceiling of the cave and cursing as she stumbles forward. Her eyes scan the trees frantically. Where are they now? Why did they rescue her and then just leave her where she started? Seeing nothing, she whirls back to paw through her meager belongings. Did they take anything from her? Everything seems to be there and she spins back to the unflinching woods, staring at her in silence as always. Her breathing is coming fast, she still isn’t quite back up to her usual level of readiness and after several minutes of panting alone and waiting for an attack that clearly isn’t coming, she steps slowly toward the stream. 

Her eyes flick down at the water and back up a few times before she gives in to her raw and aching throat and falls to her knees to drink. The water tastes of minerals and dirt, still so different after a lifetime of chemically treated water on the Ark, but she’s just happy it’s here. Once she’s had her fill she stumbles back to her things and finds some small packages of cooked meat among them, along with various dried fruit and nuts. Her stomach growls at the sight of them, but her heart pounds.

She closes her eyes for a moment and tries to calm down, but seeing the packages of food laid out for her is too much. Something in her snaps. 

“How DARE you!” she screams. Standing again she faces the trees, not caring who hears her. “You think I’m too _weak_ to do this?! You think I _need_ your help?! I’m FINE. I can take care of _myself!_ ” 

A small voice in the back of her mind points out that she just went on an unplanned beetlejuice trip for a few days, but she stamps it out angrily. 

“I don’t care WHO you’re here for, but I’ve had ENOUGH. You better STAY AWAY FROM ME,” Clarke finishes even louder, pulling her pistol from her belt as she does and pointing it for emphasis. She won’t waste bullets on a tantrum, but she wishes she could. 

She stands there for a few more moments, turning her head slowly to level a concentrated glare at no one. But she _knows_ they’re there, knows they can hear her, and that’s enough for the moment. 

She stuffs her pack furiously, sheathes her knife against her thigh and her pistol on her hip. When her sleeping roll is strapped on she rises, pivots, and marches away purposefully along the stream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew, one ordeal after another. Will Clarke make it out? Is she an idiot who's going to get herself killed in the woods? That remains to be seen! Next chapter will be up soon, I hope you'll come on this journey with me.


	2. And Out Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarke isn't alone in the woods, and she's about to find out just what kind of dangers are lurking in the trees. Running away from her problems can only take her so far, and she just might find herself running into something she isn't prepared to handle...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is folks! Thanks for your patience. This update is much longer and has much more action. It's a little wild in the real world right now and I'm not sure how regularly I can post over the holidays, but I'll do my best. For now, please enjoy the latest of Clarke's antics! Some familiar faces coming up, and for those who don't enjoy sexual content this is where the rating goes up (nothing remotely explicit, but it is implied). Comments are the best and I would love to know what you think! Thanks so much everyone!
> 
> With the stage set in the last chapter, we're definitely moving forward more quickly here. Lots to do! And Clarke has no intentions of slowing down. She's a woman on a mission after all..

As the days pass, Clarke manages to avoid further unfortunate incidents with local wildlife and gets gradually better at surviving alone. She grudgingly admits that the food packs the Grounders left her actually helped her to identify more edible plants in the forest and she eats more regularly, building up the strength she had lost. 

As days stretch into weeks Clarke feels like she’s getting an immersive trial by fire on her rudimentary Earth Skills training, but it pays off. She learns to listen to the sounds and smells and changes in the air around her. Soon enough she can move more silently through the trees, hunt without it taking nearly as long, find water or know to avoid storms by the faint feeling of dampness on her skin. She knows she’s nowhere near the level of Trikru, but she’s confident in her ability to actually take care of herself now. 

As she moves through the woods now, she also has gotten better at knowing when she’s not alone. 

The Trikru, she assumes since she’s still in their territory, hover near her on a semi-constant basis. They do their best to stay out of sight, but she’s figured out how to tell by the sound of the occasional branch breaking underfoot, or the swish of fabric, the sound of an arrow loosed at the prey they also need to hunt out here. There must be more than one of them, because otherwise she’d have caught up with whoever they are. One of them must always be on watch. 

She doesn’t think they stay with her always, but she imagines that no matter who they are, they must be switching out regularly too. Only if it were personal would it be the same few warriors following her on her endless trek. The only Grounder she knew personally enough to warrant this is... Well.

_ She’s not here.  _ She couldn’t afford this kind of time away. But she can certainly send her  _ minions. _

Clarke’s eyes cut to the side and she bares her teeth at the thought of the only person powerful enough to have earned her this guard detail. A growl sits low in her throat, maybe inspired by the rough world she’s been living in for so long now. But she can’t hold back her white hot fury at  _ Heda. _

She still has nightmares, but each time she fights her way out of the dropship or the Mountain over mounds of writhing, dying bodies, she’s begun to see  _ her _ in the distance. Her red cape always flutters gently in the smoke, her swords remain sheathed, her face somehow clean of all the dirt and grime of battle. But beneath charcoal tears, those unflinching green eyes haunt her dreams. They watch her as she screams and struggles, the feeling of burnt flesh under her fingernails and blood dripping down her face. Each day as she wakes with the metallic taste in her mouth she focuses all of her pain on the one person she knows could have stopped so much of it. It holds her up, drives her forward. 

_ I will kill her,  _ Clarke repeats her oath yet again and goes back to stoking her fire. The sun is setting, but there is still light dappling the forest floor around her. The days have been getting shorter, as far as she can tell, and she’s definitely feeling the chill more now. She’s been collecting the pelts of what she’s hunted, but she can only carry so much and she has no way to turn them into anything wearable for warmth so it hasn’t done much for her so far. 

She hears an uncharacteristic bird call for the third time in the last fifteen minutes, one she’s been keeping an ear out for. She hears it every few days, always around sunset. It has to be her  _ babysitters _ , as she’s taken to calling them in frustration. They are always hovering just out of sight, close but not close enough for her to address them. Clarke is repeatedly reminded of the guards from when she was in solitary on the Ark, close but dispassionately silent, sliding food through the door and barely sparing her a sneer before disappearing again. It’s infuriating. She can’t believe she’s come out here, away from everyone, seeking the space to heal and is still feeling crowded. 

She thinks the birdcall means shift change. She has occasionally heard hoofbeats around the time these calls echo out, and once she managed to creep closer to the source and actually watch it happen. Two warriors sitting at a small fire eating, shared their meal with a rider who had walked their horse carefully into the hollow where they hid. They exchanged words, about her, about the outside world maybe. She tried to catch more of their conversation but she didn’t have enough knowledge of Trigedasleng. She did hear a few words she knew, and one she recalled from her fevered days, “Wanheda” a few times. 

It’s not much to go on, but it’s enough for her to formulate a rough plan of escape. Given her increasing worries about the cooling temperature and incoming winter, she knows she will need resources and she doesn’t think the guards will give her the kind of assistance she’s looking for. On the Ark the climate was always carefully regulated, but she knows she won’t survive the changing seasons down here without help. 

Clarke hears a soft crackle from the near distance and picks up her bags as noiselessly as she can. She edges away from the cave she knows they are hiding in, having scouted things out a few days ago and led them to this spot. It has few vantage points for where she is set up, but is the only good shelter nearby. She’s spent the last few days pretending to be weaker than she is, napping often, hiding some of her food to the side, struggling and shivering more than strictly necessary. Now, with them thinking she’ll be eating as well as she can and shivering to sleep in her roll, she feels safe enough to risk running. 

She picks her way to the top of a nearby rise and sees a horse tied up near the cave entrance, as she expected. There is no one visible anywhere nearby, no scouts hiding where they could see her leaving. Her fire is protected pretty well and shouldn’t spread, but she left it smoldering next to a few well-placed lumpy logs that might look like a sleeping  _ Skaiyon  _ at first glance. With a last glance back at the tied-up horse and a small grin, Clarke slips away into the night.

* * *

After a few days of moving as cautiously as possible, crossing water often, not daring to make fire for fear of the smoke attracting her shadows, Clarke stands from refilling her waterskin and begins to move back towards a trading post she remembers from her early days in the woods. She hasn’t seen or heard anyone following her since she left them and she hasn’t stopped to hunt, surviving on her stashed leftover rations and putting as much space between her and the Trikru warriors as possible. 

Another few days, taking the long way around in case she’d had a tail for any of her journey, and Clarke sees smoke over the next ridge. She considers just going in as she is, with her bag full of skins and her stomach rumbling. She reconsiders. Walking past a bush full of very red berries, she pulls up short and looks down at them, her eyes narrowing. She looks up at the sky, checking the time, before looking out over the ridge and assessing how long she still needs to get there before dark. After another moment, she bends down and begins collecting as many berries as she can carry and hopes her plan works. 

* * *

That night, while the sky is still leaking red through the treetops, Clarke steps out from the trees with the intention of speaking with another human being for the first time in four full moons, though she’s only been keeping track for three. 

The building smells woody inside, but Clarke can also taste the natural soaps and herb medicines floating through the air. She steps softly toward the woman behind the table who nods at her when she enters and Clarke dusts off her friendliest expression. She doesn’t know if she’s quite managed it when the woman’s return smile leaves wrinkles of mirth around her eyes. 

“Hei,” she says. “Ai laik Clarke.” She’s thankful that she knows that much from her time war planning with the Grounders, but hopes her accent isn’t too obvious. 

“Hei, ai laik Niylah. What do you need?” 

Clarke supposes either the name or the accent gave her away, but she switches to English too, sighing internally. 

“I have some furs.. to trade. I need warmer clothing.”

“Let’s see them.” Niylah nods at her pack. Clarke lifts it and pulls out her not insignificant collection of rabbit, squirrel, and other small mammal skins. Some she couldn’t recognize, maybe species mutated beyond recognition. Either way, she hopes it’s enough. She never brought down anything big, not having the equipment only part of the reason. She didn’t think it would be worth staying in one place for long enough to get through anything the size of a deer, though she had seen a few. She also hadn’t wanted to risk attracting other animals for whom the deer (and Clarke herself) might make an easy few meals as well. Clarke isn’t sure her guard detail would have protected her from an angry bear. 

Niylah goes through the furs and trades Clarke for approximately the same volume of warm clothes, made from similar materials. Clarke appreciates this little luxury. Taking the soft fur boots in her hands, she sees the artful ways the Grounders were able to make things new and mix them in with the old, unlike her threadbare Arker clothes passed down and salvaged for generations. 

When Clarke checks through the rest of her new clothing she finds a bar of soap and a small vial of something red that sloshes back and forth when she lifts it and raises an eyebrow at Niylah. 

“For your hair,” she says with a grin, nodding at Clarke’s hastily berry-dyed tresses. 

“Oh,” she shifts her feet sheepishly. “Thanks.” 

“Do you want assistance?” 

“Uhm,” Clarke debates with herself whether this is a good idea or not, but looks up into Niylah’s soft, warm eyes and decides she’s been away from people for too long. She nods. “Yeah.”

Niylah brings Clarke around through a door at the back of the space, guiding her around a wall into what must be her living area. There is a massive bed that makes Clarke a little weak in the knees to look at, along with some shelves full of interesting forest pieces; knots and whorls of wood, crystals, some strange memorabilia from Before that looks like it could have come from the bunker that she and - Clarke stops that thought before it can take her off the rails again. Shaking her head she steps out a backdoor to find a full rain barrel and Niylah’s open hand, clearly waiting for the vial. 

Clarke hands it over and wonders how this works. 

“First, you must be clean,” Niylah says, indicating the water in front of them. Clarke’s eyes widen a little as she realizes how unpleasant this is going to be. Almost involuntarily, she shakes her head in protest, but her host holds firm. “You must wash your hair, or it will not hold.”

Bracing herself she bends down and begins to dip her hair into the rainwater, rinsing the lower parts of berry juice as well as she can. The sticky syrup has made a huge mess of her hair and it’s taking considerable effort to work through it.  _ Ugh, this is horrible. Why did I decide this was a good idea.  _

There is a sharp rap from the front of the shop and Niylah leaves without a word. 

_ Very trusting, _ Clarke thinks in surprise. Maybe she didn’t give the grounders enough credit. Not that the Arkers did much to earn their trust to begin with.  _ Only what we had to do to survive. _ She thinks of Murphy and amends her statement.  _ Mostly.  _

Unfortunately, Clarke has spent too long trying to survive and she can’t afford to be as trusting. Squeezing some residual water out of her hair she creeps back through the building and peers through a small gap in the partition to see who has come knocking. 

Two Grounder warriors are speaking in gruff tones to Niylah, who is shaking her head. Clarke narrows her eyes and tries to listen to what is being said, but it’s clearly Trigedasleng and she curses herself for not trying harder to pick it up when they were all still on the same side. One of the soldiers reaches into his coat and pulls out a small something to show Niylah and repeats a question insistently.

“ _Where_ _is Wanheda_?”They are speaking Trigedasleng, but Clarke understands all but the last word. She heard her guards in the woods use it too and wonders if this is them, out from the trees at last. She shifts behind the slats to try and see what the warrior is holding out to Niylah and catches a flash of metal, round, in the shape of a small gear. The symbol the Commander wears on her forehead. 

_ That bitch.  _ Clarke’s suspicions confirmed, the simmering anger she has grown accustomed to boils a little hotter but she tamps it down to assess whether she is about to be given up by her host. _ Wanheda… _ They must be referring to her. A new moniker from the people who abandoned hers and didn’t care to check whether they’d survive the threat they were meant to face as one.

Across from her, Niylah’s expression is wary as she glances down again at the small piece of metal, but she still shakes her head. Satisfied, Clarke eyes the warriors who have moved on to looking around the small space as though expecting to find her hiding under a table. Niylah switches to English to insist they leave. 

“The person you are searching for is not here,” she says firmly in English. Clarke recalls Lexa using ‘Gonasleng’, warrior-speak, as a means to chastise and threaten her warriors into submission. 

The second one approaches the partition she is hiding behind and she draws back, slipping out the back door again as her host calls out to the man to stay out of her private quarters. 

“I assure you, the Commander of Death is not hiding in my bed.” 

Clarke’s blood chills in her veins as the translation hits her. 

She freezes over the rain barrel, looking down at her own reflection. Is this who she is now? Her cheekbones protrude more than she remembers. Her bright blue eyes are ringed with dark circles, red drips from her hair, down the side of her face and neck, her rough Grounder attire even dirtier from days on end in the wilderness. Her knuckles go white from gripping the sides so tightly, as though she might float away back into the sky. 

For a moment, she wishes she could. 

* * *

After Niylah helped her with her hair, she invited Clarke to wait while she found furs and warmer clothing for her to try on. Clarke is curiously eyeing the assortment of objects on the shelves in her host’s bedroom and wondering how to approach the knowledge that Niylah hid her from the warriors, despite the seal of the commander in their hands. 

When she rounds the corner with a bundle in her arms, Clarke is holding up a knife from Niylah’s nightstand to greet her. 

To her credit, Niylah barely flinches, the clothes are balanced in one arm and she raises the other, palm up, empty. She looks at Clarke fully and waits in silence. 

“Why?” Clarke’s voice is hushed. They both know what she is asking. 

“You have given us freedom. I was returning the favour,” Niylah says simply, pausing intentionally before adding, “Wanheda.” 

Clarke shudders at the honorific. Blistered bodies flash through her mind and she has closed her eyes for barely a moment, trying to shake the nightmares, when Niylah has dropped the bundle and knocked the knife from her hand. 

Clarke reacts instinctively, pushing her away and whipping her pistol out from her belt to angle it with both hands towards her host. She barely stops herself from firing, but weeks alone in the woods make it a near thing and she is panting slightly, her eyes a touch too wide as she looks at the woman in a crouch before her, one hand up again and genuine fear in her eyes as she looks at the weapon.

After a few tense moments, Clarke manages to unclench her muscles and she takes a step back, lowering the pistol slightly as her hands begin to shake. She stares in Niylah’s eyes and watches as fear turns to pity. Clarke turns away angrily as Niylah rises from her crouch and extends a cautious hand, feeling traitorous tears beginning to well up in her eyes. 

“Clarke.. It is alright.” Niylah’s soft voice only makes it harder to hold it together, but Clarke feels her control slipping and she takes another step away. “You do not need to be strong always.” 

Clarke turns to look at her again, her brow furrowed at this stranger who seems to know exactly what to say. 

“You don’t understand. You don’t know… You can’t–” It comes out a hushed whisper that catches in her throat, though Clarke aches in her bones to hear it denied. 

Niylah might be reading her mind or she might only be a kind stranger, but when she reaches for her again, her fingers gently taking the pistol from her grip and setting it on a side shelf, Clarke allows it. Her eyes do not follow the weapon, but stay locked on the small bit of sympathy that she finds in Niylah’s constant gaze. A hand, soft and gentle despite the calluses Clarke can feel, cautiously caresses the side of her face. 

“Clarke.” There is a brief pause, in which Niylah glances from Clarke’s furrowed brow and watery eyes down to her trembling lips. “Not always.”

Maybe it’s the months spent alone, or her lack of sleep, but something in her can’t resist the desperate need to be closer to another person. Clarke steps forward into Niylah’s space, her own hand coming up to rest lightly on her shoulder. When her eyes flicker down to Niylah’s lips and back up again and she sees only understanding, she lets her body give in to the thrumming impulse inside her and leans in. 

* * *

In the morning Clarke is up with the sun, her body aching from both their shared activities and the discomfort from being unused to a proper bed.  _ This might be the most comfortable bed I’ve ever slept in, _ Clarke thinks, bitterly unsurprised by her inability to enjoy it. She is pulling her new clothes on and putting her old ones into her pack while Niylah stretches luxuriously under the covers when there is a vehement pounding on the door. 

A shadow crosses her host’s face as she rises and throws a tunic over herself. Without a glance back she stalks out from behind the partition and Clarke hears her open the door and greet whoever it is with the least welcoming tone she’s yet heard her use. 

With a mix of alarm and curiosity, Clarke throws the rest of her belongings into her pack and pulls out a knife as she creeps to the edge of the partition and peers out, just as two warriors push Niylah aside and shoulder their way into the trading post. 

They both have white paint and scars on their faces and carry sharp but unpolished weapons. They have heavy furs over their shoulders and begin pawing through some of the wares the Niylah had laid out on the tables in the main space. She shouts at them in angry Trigedasleng and one grunts something guttural and dismissive back at her before she switches to Gonasleng. 

“I owe the Ice Queen nothing! Get out. Go terrorize your own people!” She pulls a knife on one of the warriors, but he raises his sword and laughs at her in response. 

“Soon this will all belong to Nia. Be silent  _ Trikru _ , while we take what is ours.” He spits her clan name at her like it’s dirty and it tips Clarke off. They do not belong to Lexa’s clan and they do not belong here in this trading post either. She feels a bit of her old righteous anger again and narrows her eyes at the intruders. She is considering her best move when the warrior not currently menacing Niylah paces closer to her and puts his back to the partition. Clarke spots a spear leaning against the wall inside Niylah’s room and grabs it before launching herself into view, her newly red hair flaming as she leaps onto the nearest unsuspecting figure’s back. She plunges her knife into his shoulder as an anchor and he screams as she uses her right arm to throw the spear at the other one who flinches around in surprise when it just misses his head. 

Niylah takes advantage of the distraction to stab him in the leg and shove him towards the door, while Clarke realizes that the furs they were wearing may be inappropriate for the weather but they certainly provide a shield from things like knives. The warrior is less injured than she’d hoped and she is thrown bodily over the hulking man’s shoulder but, mercifully, lands on another pile of furs and rolls to a crouch before whirling back around. She bares her teeth and advances again, some of his blood still on her blade as she starts to rise up on her legs, enjoying the power of being taller than him for a moment and the fear on his face as she leaps again, yelling and swinging her blade down towards his already scarred face. 

He steps back into a table and stumbles sideways out of the way, narrowly avoiding her swing and hurries toward the door, past his companion who is furiously advancing on Niylah with her own blade pulled from his leg. Niylah’s eyes widen as Clarke embraces her wild persona and the effect it seems to be having by climbing back over the tables and letting out a growl as she rushes the remaining intruder. She slashes his wrist and he drops the knife, staggering back and yelling angrily in a language she does not recognize. It’s sharper than Trigeda, but Niylah must speak it because she lets out a sharp bark of laughter as he shouts a final phrase and pushes out the door.

Clarke is panting as she turns to help Niylah up off the floor, her eyes glittering with amusement and bitterness.

“Angry forest spirit, come to my defense,” Niylah says. “Better than your other title, perhaps.”

Clarke grins viciously, but Niylah’s face sobers. 

“They will be back.” 

“Who are they? Why are they threatening you?” Clarke’s brow furrows as she gazes at the door they’ve left through. Niylah stalks past her and begins straightening the items they’d mussed through on entering as she responds. 

“Ice Nation. They cross the border because they think their Queen can best the Commander.” 

“But..” Clarke considers her words, trying not to flinch too visibly at mention of the  _ Commander _ . “You’re no soldier. What does your trading post have to do with anything?” 

Niylah scoffs, “They do not care who carries the message. They only want to show their power.” 

“I know something about that.” 

A brief silence passes and Clarke is startled out of grimacing at the floor by a gentle finger under her chin. 

“My parents found ill favour under the last Commander for trading across the border. ...I know what happens when those in power forget what it means to be powerless.”

Their gazes meet, blue eyes wavering uncertainly under brown. 

“Why are you telling me this.” It comes out more of a statement, but Clarke needs to hear the rest. 

“You have not forgotten what it means to be powerless. But you must forgive yourself for the lives you carry.”

“You don’t get it,” her voice trembles, the pumping adrenaline from the fight leaving her unable to keep it level. She shakes her head vigorously. “It’s too many. You don’t understand-” her voice cracks in the end and her throat closes, images of the dead threatening to overwhelm her again. 

“You can only run from your demons for so long, Skaiyon, before they become you.” 

“...I think you mean  _ overcome, _ ” Clarke says quietly. 

“No Clarke,” Niylah watches her with sad eyes. “Holding darkness inside will only lead to it consuming you eventually.” 

Clarke’s grip on the knife tightens as the words slam into her. 

_ Consume you. Darkness inside.  _ The words are on loop in her head and she begins to shake as they morph under her warped conscience.  _ You’re broken.  _

She breaks away from Niylah and pushes through to the bedroom to grab her bag. She yanks the pistol angrily off the shelf and stuffs it into her belt, knife still clasped firmly in the other hand. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll make sure they don’t bother you again.” She knows she’s overreacting but she can’t stop herself from slamming out the door, trying to ignore the pity on Niylah’s face even as she makes no move to stop her from leaving. 

_ Why bother fighting it? If it’s so obvious that even a stranger can see it, you must really be too far gone.  _ Her brain is bitterly assaulting her as she storms through the woods and tries to pretend she knows what she’s doing. In reality, the Ice Nation warriors are probably long gone, and with the racket she’s making there’s no way she’ll sneak up on them. 

Clarke stops and leans an open palm against a nearby trunk to steady herself. She takes a few deep breaths and tries to listen to the forest around her. She hears the wind rustling through the canopy above, the usual small creatures skittering in the distance, birds overhead, but nothing human-sized or larger.  _ Probably scared them all away. Idiot.  _ Clarke growls lowly and tries again to concentrate. 

Her eyes close and her brow furrows as she crouches in silence for a minute, but she huffs in frustration when nothing stands out. She scans the horizon and nearly leaps out of her skin when something hulking shifts in the distance. She watches first one warrior, then the second, resume walking through the trees, looking behind them cautiously but unable to see her from her low stance behind the trunk she’d chosen. Unable to believe they hadn’t disappeared on her, Clarke begins to follow them, attempting to remain silent as she follows them through the trees. 

After a few minutes, they dip down into a hollow and Clarke steels herself before approaching the lip and peering in. 

Clearly these warriors are unaccustomed to the terrain. Clarke considers the poor vantage point of the shelter they’ve chosen as they rejoin a third warrior sitting by two unattended packs.  _ Shit. _ There’s no way she can take three of them. Unless she can throw her knife and incapacitate one before she jumps into the fray. Clarke briefly considers her pistol, but she’s running low enough on ammo as it is and that would definitely attract other unwanted attention in these woods. 

She is in the process of trying to cautiously work her way around the lip of the ravine they’re sheltered in to see if she can get closer and surprise them more easily when she slips on a root. With a small yelp of surprise she slides off the lip of rock and lands several feet below, directly behind the hulking man still sporting a small stab wound in the shoulder from their encounter earlier. He turns around with surprising speed for a man of his size and Clarke looks up—all the way up— into his surprised face to see a scowl form as he takes in her ruffled form among the leaves. 

“Fuck.” Clarke lets her frustrations out as he says something in his guttural language to his companions, pulling out an axe from behind him and raising it above his head before swinging it down towards her. 

“Not big on negotiating, huh?” She throws it out behind her in a bitter, sarcastic way as she rolls out of the path of his weapon, not really expecting a response. 

“Filthy Trikru. You come to die.” It’s growled after her, and really,  _ what more did I expect.  _

She skips over the compliment of being considered Trikru as she’s dodging a swing from the second warrior’s sword, sincerely hoping he’s not right about the probable outcome of this fight. She shoves herself to her feet to punch the one with a sword under his chin, the force of her upwards motion knocking him backwards, and she draws her dagger on the female warrior who had been guarding their packs. The woman smirks and draws a much more intimidating dagger of her own, the length of Clarke’s forearm and so sharp it glints in the feeble sunlight shining through the clouds. 

Clarke takes a step back, considering her options as both the woman and the one with the sword advance on her with matching weaponry. She is just beginning to reach behind her for her pistol, forced to concede that maybe this is an emergency worth her bullets, when she is yanked around by the tricep and hauled face to face with the tall one. He lifts her at least a foot off the ground with ease before slamming her body back into the ground, knocking the knife out her hand as she actually  _ bounces  _ slightly from the impact– right into the grip of the woman with them, her hand encircling Clarke’s right wrist and blade immediately at her throat. The man who just threw her to the ground reaches down and grips her firmly by the ankles, though she gets in a good kick to his right bicep before he forces her heels into the dirt. 

The third warrior is rubbing his chin angrily as he walks closer, sword hanging loosely from his other hand as he contemplates her struggling form in the firm hold of his companions. She glares up at him, not caring that the dagger at her throat is pressing hard enough to pierce the skin. She hopes she’s left him a solid bruise.

“How brave, Trikru, to come defend your territory.. alone.” He smirks and lifts his sword to hold the point over her chest. “Or stupid.”

“The Queen will not want us to leave her body here,” the tall one interjects. “We cannot cause a war now.” 

“Then we carry it back with us and drop her just over the border,” comes the callous reply. Clarke’s eyes widen as she realizes that as a nameless lost Trikru she has no diplomatic value, and no saving grace to keep herself alive or buy more time. 

“No!” she says breathlessly, doing her best to wrench herself free. The woman is forced to shift her grip to Clarke’s wrists when she manages to land an elbow into her chin and she hisses something in their language to the would-be executioner. 

The sword is lifted above her and Clarke is frantically jerking her limbs around, trying desperately to escape before the final blow comes down when she sees two more figures burst from the trees above them. Her captors’ heads whip around in surprise and the one standing twists to defend himself, the sword mercifully angled away from Clarke’s ribcage. 

“Unhand Wanheda,” a woman in Trikru clothing says angrily, not looking at Clarke. She resents the use of her new ‘title’, but it has the desired effect. 

The Ice Nation move to let go of her, the one with the sword about to strike backs off like he’s been burned. The other two look at her with awe and fear. When the grip on her legs is loosened Clarke takes immediate advantage of the moment to boot him furiously in the face and he stumbles back, cursing in his own language - as far as she can tell.

The other warrior however, recovers from her surprise quickly and tightens her grip as fear shifts to greed. 

“You know how much the Queen will give us for her,” she hisses to her companions, before turning back to face the Trikru. “She is ours now. Come and get her.”

The other two warriors back away from Clarke and muster their weapons, though they make time to glance warily at her and step a little further away before the fight begins. 

There are only two Trikru, but they still have the advantage of their home turf, fighting lighter and cleverer than the three Ice Nation weighed down with their extra furs. The Trikru send one flying by shoving him backwards over a root system to crack his head on the side of the ravine. He doesn’t get back up. The fight shifts quickly to three on two again when Clarke takes the fallen warrior's sword and swings it wildly at the hulking man with scars on his face who’d been trying to kill her moments ago. She manages to clonk him soundly across the back of his head with the broad part of the sword and considers that perhaps it’s not the ideal weapon for her to be using as he turns around, any trace of trepidation vanished. 

“Wanheda,” he growls. “I should have killed you more quickly.” 

Clarke shoves the point of the sword at his midsection but he swipes it away with a powerful stroke of his axe and it goes flying. She pulls out her pistol, thinking that of all the times to not worry about attracting attention or wasting ammo this would fit the bill, but just as she is about to fire he jerks sideways and turns to engage the second Trikru who snuck up on him from behind. 

Clarke scrambles to her feet and hurries to retrieve the sword, but she straightens right into the knife and piercing glare of the female Ice Nation warrior. Her tight braids are smeared with white paint extending back from her face and her eyes are ringed with white in an unpleasantly familiar design. The fact that her eyes are also green leave Clarke frozen for just long enough that she misses her chance to react before she’s been grabbed into a chokehold and spun tightly against this woman, the knife pressed yet again firmly to her neck. 

“Drop your weapons!” 

The hulking warrior who’d threatened to kill Clarke earlier falls to the ground, blood seeping from a huge gash in his head, and the two Trikru turn as one. Neither, Clarke notes, make any move to do as they were asked. 

“The Commander wants her alive, I believe, no?” 

“The Commander will pay handsomely for her capture,” says the male Trikru. He and the woman step closer and Clarke is dragged backwards in response. 

“Not as well as my Queen,” the warrior hisses disdainfully. “She is looking forward to meeting the Mountain Slayer for herself.” 

Clarke’s vision is swimming slightly, the hold on her windpipe beginning to wear her out as she desperately tries to think of a way out of this. 

“You cannot make it back to the border. Your fellow trespassers have already paid the price.” The male warrior is still the only one speaking as they continue their slow dance backwards. One step by the Trikru is followed by two from her captor, Clarke’s new warmer boots quickly becoming muddied against the earth. 

“I will do what I must to bring my Queen what she desires.” At her words, the knife pierces Clarke’s skin and begins to move across her neck. The Trikru finally halt, hands lifting and eyes wide as they shout at her to stop. 

The woman pauses to cackle, “Jus drein, jus daun.”

Clarke’s lethargy from lack of oxygen has finally been countered by the immediate spike of adrenaline from the cut on her throat and she somehow manages to find her feet enough to shove herself up and backwards, headbutting her captor with as much force as she can muster. 

The woman shrieks angrily as she’s thrown off, the knife sliding back out of Clarke’s skin, but not before it slices the rest of the way under her jaw.

She falls to her knees gasping and her vision swims as she watches the blood dripping off her chin intensify. She is vaguely aware of the two Trikru using the opportunity to re-engage the remaining Ice Nation warrior, but she’s losing blood too quickly and she can only hope they win the fight. Dimly, she realizes that whoever the Ice Queen is, she’s clearly not bothered by whether Wanheda is brought to her alive or dead.  _ Dead it is, I guess.  _

Clarke collapses to the ground, barely registering Wells’ appearance as he looks down at her with pity. 

“ _ Is this how it ends Clarke? The great ‘Commander of Death’, lying in the mud?” _

_ Leave me alone, _ she thinks. If this is how she goes, at least let her rest. 

_ “Yu gonplei nou ste odon, Clarke.” _

“No.” Clarke’s eyes blink back open to see the figure from all of her nightmares standing over her. Her sword is sheathed, her warpaint as crisp as it always is, and she makes no move to help Clarke. 

“ _ Get up Clarke. Don’t you want to see me again?”  _

Lexa’s words inflame Clarke and she shoves her shaking hands under herself to push her heavy body back upwards.  _ I do want to see you again, _ Clarke thinks as she wrenches one leg under herself. She growls out loud as she sways her way upright. She turns to face her nemesis, so close she can see the flecks of gold in her green eyes, gaze unflinching as Clarke huffs out angry, wet breaths from the effort of standing. 

_ I want to see you,  _ Clarke is standing so close that she should be able to feel the exhale of breath when she plunges the knife she took from Niylah into Lexa’s abdomen.  _ So I can give you this. _

When those eyes only narrow with pity and disdain, Clarke realizes she’s still hallucinating. 

Then, warm blood drips onto her hand and she looks down with a jolt of surprise.  _ No. _ But it’s not Lexa’s blood. It’s bright red, her own, still dripping off her chin. But it’s Lexa’s dispassionate eyes she looks into as she falls sideways and the world around her finally goes dark. 

* * *

A groan escapes her dry, cracked lips as she struggles back to wakefulness and Clarke begins to assess her surroundings. Her head aches almost as much as her neck, on which she can feel thick bandages wrapped around her like a scarf. Dry leaves crackle under her hands as she rolls over and twists unpleasantly, realizing her wrists and ankles are both bound, if relatively loosely. She tries to sit up, eyes still clenched shut against the waves of pain rolling over her and she lifts a hand to her forehead only to become very suddenly aware of the burlap sack over her head and the quiet rustle of someone nearby. 

“Wanheda,” comes a soft male voice. He gently lifts the bag off of her head and one of the trikru warriors is crouched in front of her, holding out a waterskin. 

Her eyes narrow in both pain and suspicion, but in the end she lifts her hands and takes the skin from him. Her gaze never leaves him as she takes a first tentative sip, then another few swallows, trying to relive some of the burning in her throat. They wouldn’t save her life and bandage her up just to poison her immediately, she thinks.  _ Probably. _

When he takes the skin back she watches him walk away before quickly assessing the cave they’re in for any chance of escape. One point of entry lets in a breath of cold air, another vent must have been dug up to the surface because the smoke from their fire drifts lazily upward and no one seems to be suffocating. Clarke is just considering whether she can loosen the rope tied around her ankles when the woman approaches her and tugs the sack back over her head.

“Hey!” she shouts out in frustrated surprise, kicking out and just barely catching the warrior in the leg as she retreats to the fire. It seems to make no difference and Clarke’s shout is drowned by the angry bark of Trigedasleng she’s thrown back at her companion. There is an awkward silence broken only by Clarke’s angry huffing against the wall, then a soft sigh from by the fire. 

“She will know where we are going soon enough,” he responds in Gonasleng. 

“Hmph,” the woman’s tone forcibly reminds Clarke of Indra. “You know our orders.”

“It will be good to be back.” 

“Perhaps.”

“You think we have another option?”

“...No.” The response is low, resigned, and Clarke has to strain to hear. She’s well aware that they are speaking English for her benefit and wonders what answers she is about to finally get. 

“Worry not,” his voice is light. There is a brief pause that tastes of finality before he delivers the news in a gentle tone that sears through Clarke like wildfire. “She will be safely delivered to Heda by sundown tomorrow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp. Clarke is definitely freaking out now. Bet you didn't think they'd be face to face so quickly, did you? Can't wait to see how that meeting goes after four months of night terrors ft. Heda herself. *ominous music plays in background*
> 
> Note to all, comments literally make my week! I will answer every one of them, hearing your thoughts is literally why I do this. Even if all you have to say is "!!!!!" I shall treasure it. (truly). The more feedback the better. Thanks for reading!


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